NAFSA 2018 Annual Conference and Expo

Arizona State University was well represented at the NAFSA 2018 Annual Conference and Expo held in Philadelphia on May 27 to June 1. NAFSA: Association of International Educators is the world's largest nonprofit association dedicated to international education and exchange.

As individual nations and regions go through educational, political, economic and cultural shifts, they change the global landscape for all of the world’s students, scholars and education professionals. NAFSA conferences are critical to international higher education (IHE) professionals because they provide updates and inform strategies for addressing the challenges of continually shifting global landscapes. Attendees schedule as many working meeting with each other as possible to accomplish goals that could otherwise require more international travel throughout the year.

Graduate College was among the ASU units that sent staff to strengthen existing international education partnerships and explore opportunities to develop new ones, serving the university’s ongoing efforts to diversify and expand its global engagement. ASU hosted a booth in the Expo Hall of the conference, providing essential meeting spaces as well as brand exposure to the estimated 9,500 to 10,000 IHE professionals and service providers who traveled from around the globe to attend.

This year’s conference theme, “Diverse Voices, Shared Commitment” highlighted the value of diverse voices in higher education, and the shared commitment of IHE professionals to “providing a welcoming and supportive environment for the success of generations of students and scholars.” A few of the hottest topics at the 2018 conference included updates on U.S. immigration policies, foreign relations, the MeToo movement’s impacts on higher education around the world, and mobility opportunities in developing regions.

The conference also offered more than 200 presentations, training, roundtable sessions, poster fairs, leadership forums, and a diverse line-up of plenary speakers. This year’s plenary speakers were former first lady Laura Bush, Bill Nye “The Science Guy,” former president of the Republic of Malawi Joyce Banda and NPR’s Terry Gross.

The NAFSA 2019 Annual Conference and Expo will be held in Washington D.C. For more information about NAFSA, membership or the annual conference visit www.nafsa.org.

To learn more about ways to make your program align with ASU’s aspiration of becoming more globally engaged contact asuglobal@asu.edu.